What the interviewer is looking for#

• How you prioritize technical debt, taking into consideration the goals of your company.
• How you perceive technical debt and its implications.
• Whether or not you are empathetic toward how it affects your team.

What a good answer looks like#

“As an engineering manager, I have realized that it’s very important for me to keep an eye on engineering tasks and make sure they’re factored into plans and timelines that product managers may set.

On one of the teams I worked in, we did three-week sprints. Before each sprint, we would have immersive planning sessions and a whole backlog of business and functional requirements that came from the product manager. In addition to all that, we also maintained a separate backlog of engineering items. Product managers are usually not aware of these engineering items, but I see them as an important part of the backlog that needs to be addressed and prioritized. We brought these items into every sprint plan, and it was a good mix of things depending on the requirements of the sprint. In some sprints, after negotiation, technical debt was given less priority simply because there was a committed deliverable to the client. In other sprints, we had more margin.

As an engineering manager, it was my responsibility to make sure everyone was aligned and convince nonengineering members of the importance of the engineering items. I couldn’t expect them to be aware of things like simple refactoring and how it could impact future functional backlog delivery. It was my job to communicate this to them. Therefore, it was my responsibility to advocate for these items wherever needed and give them their due importance when each sprint was planned.”